It is known to use continuous drum type earth moving equipment, such as continuous drum type miners, in soft rock mining, particularly coal and iron ore mining and increasingly in salt and potash mining. Such drum type earth moving equipment typically include a rotatable drum on which are disposed several cutting tools, for example cutting picks, that cut soft rock away from a target rock body during use as the drum rotates. The cutting tools are distributed on the drum in a pattern referred to as a lacing design.
Increasing demands to improve cutting performance, improve safety and energy efficiency and reduce operating costs have lead to a desire to improve the design of cutting drums, and in particular to improve the lacing design of the cutting tools on a cutting drum. In addition to the lacing design, the performance of the cutting drum also depends on the relationship between the cutter drum type, cutting geometry of the drum, rock being mined and operating parameters of the earth moving equipment.
With current drum type miners, in order to modify the cutting drum design it is necessary to return the cutting drum to the manufacturer in order to make the modifications because it is not feasible to modify the cutting drum on-site. This is unduly time consuming and inefficient.